January Movies

The Gamers:  Dorkness Rising

Yes, I'll admit it, I've done some gaming in my life and this movie did a great job of depicting many of the personality types you run into who partake in such games.  The film was much better than I expected with some good laugh out loud moments.  But if you're not familiar with the subculture of role playing games most of the humor will not resonate.

Moon

I think Sam Rockwell is a great actor and this film provided him an opportunity to show off his skill.  He's pretty much the only character on screen, or the only 2 characters on screen, for the majority of this hour and a half feature.  He doesn't disappoint.  However, the story itself, although interesting, seemed somehow contrived and the ending abrupt.  It was enjoyable, but not memorable.

9

9 is an animated feature directed by a recent film school grad who was plucked out of obscurity by Tim Burton after he saw the 10 minute short this film was based on.  Also, it didn't hurt that the short animated film was nominated for an Oscar in the category.  The short is included on the DVD and is quite good, with no dialogue, but no need for it either.  The film expands on the world glimpsed in the short and extends the cast of characters to include the full 9 creations.  Each with their own personality...kind of.  It's a fun film with some great animation.  It's worth watching but again, not exactly memorable.

District 9

District 9 is a kind of mockumentary action film.  It tells the story of a group of aliens who come to earth and end up segregated into a slum called District 9.  The film quickly turns into an action movie and in the end you come away entertained but you can't help but feel in the back of your head there was a pretty serious message in there somewhere.  I thoroughly enjoyed the film, but some large plot holes kept it from being a great movie.  Definitely worth watching.

Sunshine Cleaning

This film stars Amy Adams in one of her better roles.  She is a single mom with a pretty screwed up life.  She's a maid who is sleeping with her ex-boyfriend who married someone else.  She can't seem to get her life together.  She gets the idea to start a business cleaning up after crime scenes and employs her equally screwed up sister to help her.  Sounds interesting enough, but I just couldn't get into the film.  I found myself looking at the clock wondering how much longer this thing would go on.  I nearly turned it off twice.  The one redeeming quality was that the ending wasn't necessarily where you thought the film was going.

Extract

I don't think there's any way Mike Judge can top Office Space and Extract isn't as good, but it' still a fun movie.  There are some great one-liners and running jokes in the film, but it just doesn't have the same lasting affect that Office Space does.  Maybe if I worked on a factory floor instead of an office I would feel different.  Also, I'm not sure what it is about Mila Kunis that makes her so attractive, maybe it's the oversized eyes, anyway, she does a great job as the con artist taking full advantage of male frailties.  Again, worth the watch, but not really for repeated viewing.

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

My daughter watched this film with her friends and then wanted me to watch it with her.  She laughed and laughed and got a big kick out of the monkey.  I enjoyed the frenetic pace of the dialogue and some of the one liners were great.  The scene with the snowballs had me laughing out loud.  The story itself is pure kids movie, but overall, I enjoyed the film.  I kind of got a chuckle out of the bit with the reporter not being taken seriously when she was less attractive.  Kind of goes along with our current media situation.

Six Feet Under:  Season 1

Many people told me that if I liked Dexter, I should check out Six Feet Under, so I finally did.  I rented the first disk of the first series which contained the first 3 episodes.  Unfortunately, it didn't click with me.  I really didn't care about any of the characters and the situation seemed too typical episodic network dramaish.  Just nothing that caught my interest.  I'm not saying it's bad, it just didn't pull me in like Dexter or Dead Like Me.

Lord of the Rings:  The Fellowship of the Ring

My daughter and I sat down over a weekend to watch this more than 3 hour extended version of the film.  We split it into two days just as the film is split into two DVD's.  She had never seen it before and I think she enjoyed it.  She's not sure if she's ready for the next film as the goblin/orcs kind of freaked her out a bit.  I won't include this film in my list of 2010 viewings, but I did watch it in January, so here it is.

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

I've seen this film before and it made my best movie list of 2008 so it won't be on the list of movies for 2010. But now that I have a Blu-ray player, I had to go out and pick up this movie.  I was only going to watch the opening scene, but ended up watching the entire film.  It really is a great movie and I caught a bit more detail of the story this time around, or maybe I had just forgotten.  Either way, It's worth a viewing with great acting all around and a story that keeps spinning out of control.